


insomniac

by regionalsky



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: I promise im not imitating any mental illness, Ive actually though about it a lot, but josh does show up, dont kill me, like multiple personality disorder, no smut oops, not joshler sorry, this is not supposed to be anything other than how I imagine some things, this is weird and mostly written really late at night
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-08
Updated: 2017-04-08
Packaged: 2018-10-16 06:36:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10565679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/regionalsky/pseuds/regionalsky
Summary: Skylar is happy. Tyler is not. Tyler only exists in the night, when the boy comes. When Sky goes away and writing has to happen, when memories invade real life with people who Sky, or Tyler, has never been.Why does this boy, this boy Tyler knows he knows and Sky knows doesn't exist, why does he insist on being on paper?Where is he coming from?





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is supposed to be confusing. Clarified wuth further chapters.  
>  _he_ is not the same as he
> 
> I have a plan, but I would love any advice/thoughts/ideas that you can think of! I promise I'm not just making this up as it goes.

_He_ came out in shivers. Uncontrollable shivers of cold, hopeless fear. He hated the dark, ran from room to room in his house late at night to avoid the shadows. Windows and light warped around him, a heart heavy enough to bend gravity.  
Voices came, too. _He_ was always there.  
The _boy_ thought _he_ was more important than _he_ was. He refused to admit that _he_ was probably right.  
_He_ liked it when he called _him_ a demon. Loved it when he said he hated _him_ , feared _him_ , that the idea of _his_ long fingers and wide palms made him break down in shivers.  
The room bounced around him. Music to make a silence. Stories left his mind, poems, rhymes, the words that terrified him. The scratching of the pen against the college lined paper was enough to send him into shivers again. And at night, when there were no stories to be lived, he played them out inside his head.  
Anything to keep the self labeled demon out of his head.  
Music flowed. Wind shook the pine trees outside his front door, twinkling the lights of the neighbor’s house. He held on to his earbuds like they were a lifeline, grasping, anything to keep him from drowning. Rose on a board big enough for two, floating in a freezing ocean. Held his music on his own- he couldn’t help _him_. There had already been too many failed attempts.  
Whispers were silent, other than the one in his head.  
_Sleep,_ _he_ said. _You can sleep. And I will see you there._  
He knew he could’ve. He probably should’ve. But when was he going to get his peace if it wasn’t at 4 in the morning?  
Did he want to see _him_?  
Could he?  
He needed his quiet that only came in the small hours.  
_No peace,_ _he_ responded. He knew what _he_ was going to say, anyways. Took control of his thoughts in retaliation. Dug around his memories, something about a daytime hidden behind a big screen. He couldn’t see who he was, or who _he_ was, only what it smelled like, what _he_ felt like.  
A story, pale faces and snow dusted hair and ice covered concrete marked with painted squares for a game he hadn’t played for years, rose up. His fingers twitched. Shivers intensified. The dark got bigger.  
A school bus and green track jerseys, sharpie on the palm of their hands and black turf stuck in shoes. The smell, he knew the _boy_ \- the 312 on the side of the chipped yellow paint school bus, the fading leather of the seats, he knew he had to write. They had to be let free.  
_Get up. Get up. Give in. You know I will win._  
A single finger off the couch, and he would be eaten. Destroyed. Blown up. It could get him. The dark reached out. It was a miracle he had reached the couch in the first place- flipped off the lights and ran as fast as he could, jumped, and almost fell off. He had to bite his lip to make sure he was in the right place, and his mouth wasn’t open. The rough texture rubbed against his cheek, reminding him he was still awake. _He_ couldn’t do anything to him.  
_Tyler._  
“No,” he whispered. “I’m sorry,” the music whispered for him. “Sorry.”  
There were a few minutes where the dark was warm, it was in his own head. The part without stories or demons or music or whoever he was in the daytime. No dependency, just a hint of Sky. He was warm. Tyler couldn’t shiver, nothing grew in his stomach or his chest. His fingers had feeling. Then, he opened his eyes.  
_He_ stared down at him, unblinking. A face he hadn’t seen, hadn’t touched, hadn’t smelled, in at least a year. Blood started leeching from his fingertips. A shiver built up, right in his lungs, but he shoved it down. It could not see him shake.  
As far as he knew, _he_ was real. The time he had spent with _him_ was real. At some point, Tyler was real under the sun. He liked the sun, and could almost see Sky. Almost like it was daytime. His lips could smile of their own accord.  
Brick walkways surrounded them. _His_ tall frame always looked down on him, unnaturally blonde hair meticulously combed to the left. _He_ reached out to him, pain and grief consuming _his_ face.  
“Tyler, please,”  
He shook his head. “No,” backed away, hands in front of him. “No- no- please- not right now-” _He_ stepped forward, looked him in the eyes. “Please?”  
When he didn’t respond, when he couldn’t say no, _he_ gripped his wrist. Where were they? Where were the other kids, the adults, the people who were supposed to be there constantly? The people that promised his they wouldn’t leave him with him?  
Because there was nothing he could do now. Nothing.  
Tyler felt the hope drop out of his stomach, a giant hole. The sun was gone- and the clock- it was frozen- five minutes had passed- 4:05-  
He looked up with teary eyes and then he wrote the story, the story _he_ was in, a sunny field with dandelion crowns.  
When _he_ finally let go, tall frame sinking back in to the shadows, Tyler laughed. At least there were shadows left. Maybe some sleep.  
He laughed again, tasting the blood from his lip. Sky wasn't coming back-  
and although-  
he would still go by the name-  
Sky was gone for a long time.


End file.
